The Maccabaean

first of all. When a Jewish character appears on Madame Radziwill’s melodramatic stage, he is always presented as beneath contempt—physically, mentally, morally. Joffe is “a terrible looking Jew . . . not troubled with anything so inconvenient as scruples in any shape or form . . . he smiled that abominable fat smile peculiar to his race... . he had enormous ears which seemed as if Nature had stuck them on the side of his head as an afterthought; they were large, wide, and dirty. . . the look of some low beast of prev. a hvena or somethins of that kind.”

EEE SEE Zn = BEE A Jew in Sweden is one “who had been condemned to some years, or months, I don’t remember which, in prison in Russia, but had contrived to get himself appointed purveyor of the Russian Red Cross in Stockholm, where he was looked upon as one of the new millionaires whom the war had helnped to sprinz into existence.”

To look at “the thoroughly repulsive” Trotzky “was immediately to understand anti-Semitism and to feel more than tempted to seize this monstrous representative of the Hebrew race and give him a sound smacking. He disgusted one physically before there had been an opportunity of exchanging two words with him.” Kameneff “was another repulsive Jew, but undoubtedly an intelligent creature whose only principle was to enrich himself at any price and in the ahartest af Hmes”

It is Jewish pedlers who act as advance agents of the Germans in Poland. Of another group, again, Madame Radziwill remarks, with what she no doubt regards as deep sub- ‚tlety, “By a curious— what shall I call it?—coincidence, all these men, most of whom were about to play a leading part in the great betraval of Russia, were Jews.”

Now the reader would have no great quarrel with Madame Radziwill, even if he held that she was indulging in pure flights of the imagination, provided that she held the scales of justice even. But that is not the case. A supposed Jewish traitor or scoundrel not only receives the full force of her obloquy, but his whole race is condemned wholesale. A traitor of another race, on the contrary, is regarded with a mild eye, patted on the back occasionally, and never condemned outright.

Thus Madame Radziwill’s whole book is based on the supposed revelation of a certain German secret service oflicer, called by her Captain Rustenberg, who has become “disgusted with the methods employed by men whom he had once believed to be honest;” i.e.,a traitor. This captain had the usual good fortune of the heroes of secret service “revelations” to be everywhere that important events were going on, to meet all high personages, and to be entrusted with the most momentous missions, so that he was able to tell Madame Radziwill all that took place, reporting even exact words. Naturally, he is not condemned. .

Again, there is a Colonel Masojodeff who gives to the Germans his country’s plans and was directly responsible (according to the omnipresent Captain Rustenberg) “for the horror known by the name of the Battle of Tannenberg.” The Captain, to be sure, shows his loathing, but he gives in full the defense of the noble colonel and afterwards says not a word against him, save that “one would have been tempted to think there was a taint of madness in him had it not been for one damning circumstance—the large amount of money the German government paid him for his treason.”

Once more, the author remarks, as if casually, that the reason the Polish strongholds “were taken with such ease was that the Germans had friends among the authorities in charge of them who made but a formal resistance when they were besieged.” Were these authorities Jews? If not, why does Madame Radziwill not say, with characteristic subtlety, “By a curious— what shall I call it?—coincidence, all these traitors, corruptionists, apostates, War ÖOflice renegades, rogues, knaves, and reptiles, most of whom were to play a leading part in the betrayal of Russia, were Slavs.” Oh, why

does she not describe "that sly smile of duplicity peculiar to the Russian aristocrat?"

to the Russian aristocrat? The type of shallow mind capable of a book of this kind cannot realize of course the profound forces of which creatures like Lenine and Trotzky are the dirty froth. A Russian herself, Madame Radziwill does her country no service when she asserts that money can buy it. Germany took advantage of the rottenness in Russia, but that rottenness was not created by German agents—it is solely the work of the class to which Madame Radziwill belongs, and it might have been prevented if that popular education for which Jews above all clamored had been allowed.

What one does wonder at is that a reputable publisher should allow his imprint to appear on such a mess of hearsay gossip, misinformation, and prejudice. Certainly the publishers must realize that to America, as to every other democracy in the world today, the Jews have given the full measure of devotion, and have offered their lives freely on the battlefield that democracy might live. America has deserved their love and sacrifice; when Russia has become a fit nation for free human beings, she too will have the Jews she deserves. Even at that, numerous Russian Jews are filled with an almost fanatical devotion to Russia that is ill reauited by books like the present.

Koheleth as Gentle Cynic

A Gentle Cynic: Being the Book of Ecclesiastes. By MORRIS JASTROW, JR. J. B. Lippincott Company, Philadelphia, 1919, 255 pp.

HERE is a book that does at least two things well. In the first place, it gives a new translation of that famous book of the Bible called Koheleth, and gives it from a novel point of view that results in a greater unity of effect. In the second place, it affords an excellent introduction to higher criticism as it is today—liberal-minded but not bigoted, informed as to literary values, and thoroughly well-documented.

According to Dr. Jastrow, Ecclesiastes is a “strange book to have slipped into a sacred collection. This would never have happened had the book been permitted to remain in the form which the author originally gave it. Instead of taking Koheleth as he was, the attempt was made by those who did not approve of his tone and of his attitude to twist his thought to conform to the conventional views and beliefs of the age.”

This manipulation at various hands had a twofold purpose in view—to make the utterances in the book conform to the tradition of Solomon (to whom the authorship was ascribed) and to make the teachings more palatable to the pious and conservative.

What Dr. Jastrow does is to lop off what he considers additions to the original text, about one-fourth of the total. The remainder he translates and offers as the authentic Koheleth.

It is obvious that, in part at any rate, such excisions are a matter of Dr. Jastrow’s judgment, although he supports his views with careful arguments. Again, his judgment as to what to include or reject coheres with his conception of the character of the author. In brief, this conception is described in his title: Koheleth was “a gentle cynic.” Koheleth “is modern,” says Dr. Jastrow, “because with great literary skill he deals with those aspects of human life which are always the same. He is almost brutally frank in holding the mirror up to life. For all that, he is neither a scoffer nor a pessimist. He loves life and has intense sympathy with the struggles and sufferings of humanity, but he smiles at the attempts of zealous reformers to change human nature or to improve a state of things which (as he believes) follows logically from the conditions under which mankind carves out its career. Koheleth is not a cold and